Not having any problems with computer, but wondering if it will speed things up a bit, without loosing protection, if I disable Malwarebytes and Spywareblaster (Windows Defender is disabled). That will leave me with just Norton 360, freely installed by Comcast. I don't mind Norton's footprint and I think it is doing a good job for me.
I think it depends on what you're trying to speed up. If you're talking about boot time, and if you have Malwarebytes and Spywareblaster set to start up as soon as you power on the computer, then you may see a few seconds improvement in operating system boot time. But if you're talking about a computer that's already gone through the boot process and is just waiting for you to give it some work to do (like opening a website or accessing your files and folders) I don't think you will see any noticeable improvement by disabling Malwarebytes or Spywareblaster.
Several months ago I tested my home computer in a completely non-scientific way. I did a factory restore using the recovery disks I made when I bought the computer. I installed all the Windows Updates, programs and applications like Office, SnagIt, Roxio, Microsoft Security Essentials, etc. I left everything at default settings including my paid version of Malwarebytes Pro. (Sorry, I've never used Spywareblaster.) My boot time was averaging 1 minute 45 seconds to about 2 minutes 10 seconds. Then I disabled everything at startup except for MSE, Malwarebytes and my Synaptics touchpad. Boot time decreased to about 50 seconds to 1 minute 10 seconds. Then I disabled Malwarebytes so it would be an on-demand scanner only. I did not see any difference in boot time. And as far as accessing websites once the boot process had finished, I did not see any appreciable difference no matter what was enable or disabled.
Having said all of this, each computer is different so maybe by disabling Malwarebytes and Spywareblaster you'll see a good increase in performance.
The fewer programs a PC is running the less overhead is used and may help...
Is it worth it to disable this protection to gain that "bit" of performance, each person must answer for themselves and their system.
Disable Malwarebytes and SpywareBlaster, and see if you notice a worthwhile performance increase.
For me I don't see enough of a performance difference to risk losing some protection.
And fwiw, my Test box has a OLD AMD Athlon 5600+ dual core.
Does anyone know for sure Norton includes ALL protection covered by these other products? (I doubt it)
I don't have Norton, so I can't comment on that...
I do use MBAM Pro with Avast(free) OR MS Security Essentials, and don't have performance/conflict issues...(along with Spywareblaster on some systems).
I see marsmimar just replied, and I agree...
I too have tested and use different combinations of Protection products...
I have multi-boot systems, so if a program update causes a system to not boot up, I should still be able to boot up the PC with a different OS/protection programs.
I don't have them set to startup (I use/have both) but can't say as if I've ever noticed a difference.
I would establish a Clean boot for all but your real-time malware protection and AV, check logs for repeat errors to resolve, utilize the System Resources to solve problems found, Generate A System Health Report, test hardware as shown in Troubleshooting Steps for Windows 7.
In addition use these steps to Optimize Windows 7 especially editing visual effects of animation, fading, sliding, dragging intact and selection rectangle.
The free versions of MBAM doesn't need to run at all at boot since it doesn't provide real time protection so just make sure it isn't in your start up menu. The one that is going to cause the most system slowdown is Norton 360. I had that...once. It practically made my XP system unusable so I ditched it.
Shutting down services you don't need, such as AeroGlass (pretty but resource heavy Windows dressing; pun intended) will lighten your system load more.
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